Contact time of impacting droplets on a superhydrophobic surface with tunable curvature and groove orientation

Abstract

Regulating the impact dynamics of water droplets on a solid surface is of great significance for some practical applications. In this study, the droplet impingement on a flexible superhydrophobic surface arrayed with micro-scale grooves was investigated experimentally. The surface was curved into cylindrical shapes with certain curvatures from two orthogonal directions, where axial and circumferential grooves were formed, respectively. The effects of curvature diameter and Weber number, as well as the orientation of grooves on droplet spreading and retracting dynamics were analyzed and explained. Results show that the circumferential grooves promote the spreading of a droplet in the azimuthal direction, where the droplet rebounds from the surface with a stretched shape. This mechanism further reduces the contact time of impacting droplets on the superhydrophobic surface compared to the other curving mode.